My Rap on Rap

It's always great when I can come across a writer who feels exactly the same way I do about an issue that's never talked about. Thank you Bill Simmons (espn.com)

(taken from his 2/23 article on the NBA All Star Weekend from ESPNs Page 2. I highly recommend reading his articles)

...Nelly was the main event at the NBA Players Association's party (NBPA), which was such a hot ticket that scalpers were hawking the invitations outside. I've never seen that before. Anyway, Nelly came out with like nine of his friends, who proceeded to scream the lyrics to his songs in the background, which caused him to start screaming ... basically, everyone screamed at the top of their lungs for an entire hour.

So here's my question: If Nelly released a studio album called "Here are some new songs that I recorded with 10 people who aren't singers screaming in the background and overpowering my lyrics," would anyone buy it? Of course not. So why does almost every rapper approach concerts this way? Are they worried that they don't have any talent, so they hide behind the screaming? Is it a posse thing, like they're worried about picking the two or three buddies who should be on stage, so they just go with their 10 closest friends? And why isn't this more of an outrage? Seriously, if you bought tickets to a U2 concert and Bono came out with nine buddies from Dublin who proceeded to ruin every song, wouldn't you ask for your money back? I don't get it.

Sorry, did you say 'sex'? Not in Big 12 country

Who needs a vibrator when their uncle or cousin will do? War Big 12!
Nascar, Nascar ra-ra-rahhh, when I say 'yeee', you say 'hahhh'


Court Rejects Appeal on Sex Toy Sales Ban
Tue Feb 22,10:33 AM ET

Reuters
By James Vicini
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) rejected on Tuesday a constitutional challenge to an Alabama law that makes it a crime to sell sex toys.

The high court refused to hear an appeal by a group of individuals who regularly use sexual devices and by two vendors who argued the case raised important issues about the scope of the constitutional right to sexual privacy.

The law prohibited the distribution of "any device designed or marketed as useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs." First-time violators can face a fine of up to $10,000 and as much as one year in jail.

The law, adopted in 1998, allowed the sale of ordinary vibrators and body massagers that are not designed or marketed primarily as sexual aids. It exempted sales of sexual devices "for a bona fide medical, scientific, educational, legislative, judicial or law enforcement purpose."
Georgia and Texas are the only other states that restrict the distribution of sexual devices, according to the court record in the case.

Attorneys for the American Civil Liberties Union (news - web sites), representing those who challenged the law, argued that private, consensual sexual conduct among adults is constitutionally protected and beyond the reach of government regulation.

They said the Supreme Court's decision in 2003 striking down a Texas sodomy law also created a fundamental, constitutional due process right to sexual privacy.

"The evidence shows that this case is not about novelty items, naughty toys or obscene matter. It is a case about human sexuality and extremely intimate acts," the attorneys said.

They said Alabama has never explained "why sales of performance enhancing drugs like Viagra, Cialis and Levitra and even ribbed condoms are not similarly prohibited."

The attorneys said the state did not contest the evidence that about 20 percent of all American women use a vibrator and at least 10 percent of sexually active adults use vibrators in their regular sex life.

A federal judge ruled against the state and found a constitutional "right to use sexual devices like ... vibrators, dildos, anal beads and artificial vaginas."

But a U.S. appeals court based in Atlanta upheld the law by a 2-1 vote.

The appeals court said it agreed with Alabama that the law exercised time-honored use of state police power to restrict the sale of sex. It rejected the ACLU's argument that the constitutional right to privacy covered the commercial sale of sex toys.

Alabama Attorney General Troy King opposed the ACLU's appeal.

"This case involves conduct that is both public and commercial -- the sale of sexual devices to the general public in commercial retail shopping centers" and at in-house Tupperware-style parties, he said.

King said the law respected "the distinction between public commercial conduct and purely private behavior." He said, "It ... stays out of people's bedrooms."
The justices rejected the appeal without any comment or recorded dissent.

Where have you gone Stevie Y?

by Gene

I still remember it like it was yesterday. It was my first communion and my mother gave me a present to celebrate. She handed me an envelope and a card. Inside the envelope were two tickets to see the Detroit Red Wings at Joe Louis Arena. I was 8. I still remember sitting in the upper deck, feeling so small and like I was a million miles away, but still, my dad and I loved it. Then, during the second intermission, a huge line of people formed on the steps next to me and my dad.

“What’s going on?” I asked. “Oh, I think Gordie Howe is signing autographs during intermission tonight.” I looked up and sure enough, there was Mr. Hockey, signing away, shaking hands, always with a smile on his face. I was hooked.

Fast forward 22 years later and I’m still an avid hockey fan, or at least I was, until the events of today will most likely leave me scarred forever regarding my favorite professional sport. Today, for the first time in North American history, the NHL became the first professional sports league to cancel an entire season due to a labor dispute. Commissioner Gary Bettman made the announced at 11:00 A.M. and I’m sure him and his owners couldn’t be happier.

What a pathetic day it is to be an NHL fan. Here the millions of us are, listening to the signs that an agreement may be reached, and then learning that the season was cancelled due to a difference of $6.5 million in a salary cap proposal. The sad thing is, even with this cap, it wouldn’t solve the problems the league faced and I think most fans admit this. What’s even more sad is that the chief problem isn’t going anywhere…and that problem’s name is Gary Bettman.

Gary Bettman came to the NHL from the NBA in the early 90s. The owners voted him in as their first commissioner on the thought that he could do for the NHL what him and David Stern did for the NBA. Unfortunately, he did just that. Over the last 10 years, eight new teams have been added to the league, franchises relocated, tv ratings plummeted, and salaries and ticket prices escalated to never-before-seen rates.

Kudos Mr. Bettman to a job well done.

Pieces of blame lie all around in the shrapnel that once was the NHL as we once knew it – and don’t think for a second the game will ever be the same, not for a long time. The players caved to a cap, only after saying for months they would never do it. The owners, meanwhile, never really “negotiated” and after all, aren’t they the ones who have blindly thrown money around to third-line centers (thanks New York! Don’t let the door hit you on the way out).

But, when this is all said and done, blame can be squarely placed at the footsteps of the NHL Commissioner. The man came into what was admittedly the fourth biggest professional league in the U.S. With visions of grandeur and dollar signs (thanks to the hundreds of millions the league owners recouped in expansion fees), Bettman has successfully ignored the die-hard hockey fans of what is a niche-sport, and allowed it to fall below the ranks of the PGA and NASCAR. Instead of fast-paced action, what was once an exciting sport has turned into a dull, clutching-and-grabbins style of play that doesn't bring in any new fans. Of course, had Bettman made the league enforce existing rules, this wouldn't have happend.

There are so many mistakes, there isn't enough bandwidth to discuss them. Some of the biggest mistakes include: allowing for Wayne Gretzky to be fleeced from Edmonton to L.A., leading to unproven expansion in markets that don't care about hockey; focusing far too much attention to outlawing fighting in order to gain new, non-violent loving fans, thus alienating long-time fans; and last but not least, accepting a collective bargaining agreement in 1995 that did nothing to resolve the problems of the day. Today's lockout is simply an extension of Bettman's inability to bridge a gap with players over the last ten years.

How did it all come to this? The answer is simple. Greed and ego…with a lot of help by one man alone. The main person in charge. Gary Bettman.

May he rot in hell, becuase players like Steve Yzerman, Mario Lemieux, Mark Messier, Chris Chelios and Al MacInnis don't come around every year. I've been watching those players since I was 8. And now, all of them have most likley played their last game, and it wasn't on their own terms. Those players deserve better. The league deserves better. The fans deserve better.

The sooner the owners and their patsy Gary Bettman realize this, the better. Unfortunately, it may be too late.

Gary Betttman and Bob Goodenow....

....can both kiss my big fat white ass!

NHL Season on Ice? Say it Ain't So?

by Gene

O.K. Let's get this straight. I'm a huge hockey fan. Live it. Breathe it. And I'll go to the grave knowing there isn't any finer sports competition than the annual Stanley Cup playoffs. It's the toughest championship to attain in the world. But the owners or the NHL and the players are willing to throw it all out the window this weekend if they can't come up with a "compromise" and sign a new bargaining agreement.

How sad.

What's even more sad is that neither leaders - Commissioner Gary Bettman or NHLPA chief Bob Goodenow - have ever really sat down and tried to reach a middle ground. All they've done is dressed up their own little pigs and sprayed perfume on them time and time again, trying to make them smell better with every passing negotiating session. And whenever bringing in a third-party negotiator was brought up, both sides laughed off the idea.

Let's look at the main facts of the offers and the league as it stands:

The league wants a hard salary cap with salaries making up no more than 55% of total league revenue. The problem, the league says, is that salaries have skyrocketed to a point so high that the league has lost $1.8 billion over the last 8 years. Of course, during this time, nobody was holding a gun to the owners' heads forcing them to dole out multi-million, long-term contracts to third-line players. The owners also didn't complain when they reaped tens of millions in payments from teams that entered the league from non-traditional hockey hotbeds, never minding the fact that going from 22 teams in 1990 to 30 teams by 2000 might somehow have a negative effect on the overall quality of the sport.

The players want nothing to do with a hard salary cap at all and have said from the beginning they'll never accept one. And can you blame them? They've seen their average salary rise by 300% over the last five years. In 1990, only a handful of players made more than a million dollars. Today, the average salary is $1.3 million. Needless to say, the discrepancy of pay has gone up ten fold. Unfortunately for the players, they hold absolutely no leverage.

So where does this leave the league? Sitting inside a bus, teetering on a cliff, with the commissioner ready to drive it over the edge and watching it crash to the bottom.

The saddest thing is that if both leaders weren't so stubborn, a third-party negotiator could easily come in and broker a deal. The league wants a hard cap, the players don't. There is a middle ground called a tax-based system. It may not be perfect for baseball, but it's a start, and it least it will make some owners shiver when they are faced with paying 50% more on the dollar for exceeding a certain salary threshold.

The big question for hockey fans is, can a deal be made by the weekend? Even the most optimistic spectators at this point say no. Hopefully, cooler heads will prevail, but after watching the commissioner stay out of the negotiations for two months, then suddenly reappear and throw his previous offer in the face of the union, it appears the league is willing to be the first one to shut down for an entire season. What a waste. What a sad state of affairs.

Who's Your Booby? Fox, That's Who

Quick everyone! Hide your kids! There's a commercial with a buxom brunette on that will offend your children. Hurry! Don't watch...look, look away. For the love of God, please don't watch this ad. It will ruin your standing in the Puritan church. What would your priest say? Take this off the air please. But don't take off Temptation Island or that lesbian kiss scene from the O.C. that you've been promoting for weeks. That's hot!

Also, don't pull the ad that mocks the slaying of a cat or the beating of a person as a case of mistaken identity. Because as we all know. Violence? That's funny and entertaining. Breasts and sexuality? That's the devils work.

What a bunch of hypocritical fools this country has become.

And for the record, this writer had no problems with any of the commercials. I'm just using the other commercials as an effect to show the hypocrisy that is big media in this country. Thank God for Rupert Murdoch.



Racy Ad Pulled After Super Bowl Airing
Television - AP
By SETH SUTEL, AP Business Writer

NEW YORK - A racy ad for a vendor of Web site names was pulled at the last minute from a second showing during the Super Bowl telecast on Sunday after NFL executives objected that the spot made light of Janet Jackson "wardrobe malfunction" incident in last year's halftime show.

The ad for GoDaddy.com Inc. featured a buxom woman appearing before a "broadcast censorship" hearing making her case that she wanted to appear in a commercial, when suddenly she suffers a malfunction of her own as a strap breaks on her already skimpy top.

One of the elderly committee members reaches for an oxygen mask, while a woman suggests that the woman put on a turtleneck. The logo of the fake news channel was "G-Spin," and the hearings were supposedly being held in Salem, Mass., the town made famous by witch trials.
Although the spot was initially approved by Fox executives prior to airing, a decision was made during broadcast not to air the spot a second time later in the game. Brian McCarthy, a spokesman for the NFL, said that the NFL's chief operating officer, Roger Godell, expressed his "disappointment" to Fox executives after seeing the first airing of the ad.

McCarthy said the NFL had not reviewed the ad prior to its airing, and was not aware that it had been scheduled to be repeated later in the game. "We questioned why a spot of that nature was in the game," McCarthy said, noting its "inappropriateness" and the fact that it referred to last year's incident.

Jon Nesvig, the president of advertising sales for Fox Broadcasting Co., a division of News Corp., said in a statement that when the commercial ran in the first half, "it became obvious to us that its content was very much out of step with the tenor set by the other ads and programming broadcast by Fox on Super Bowl Sunday, so Fox made the decision to drop its repeat airing."
A spokesman for Fox declined to elaborate beyond the statement. Fox had already rejected a second ad from GoDaddy.com prior to the broadcast.

McCarthy said that the NFL had several conversations with Fox in the weeks leading up to the game in order to "make sure that the overall presentation of Super Bowl Sunday would be suitable for a mass audience. ... That's why we questioned this particular content."
The NFL was determined not to have a repeat of last year's complaints over the Janet Jackson halftime incident, in which her breast was exposed after singer Justin Timberlake (news) ripped off a piece of her costume.

Warren Adelman, chief operating officer of GoDaddy.com, said the company was "very disappointed" that the ad was pulled, and received no advance warning from Fox. The Scottsdale, Ariz.-based company is still in discussions with Fox about what kind of restitution would be made, he said.

"The irony is that a parody of censorship was itself censored," Adelman said.

The Double Standard of Terrell Owens

by Gene

Far be it for me to ever stand up for a professional athlete whom I despise, but today I am forced too. That player is Terrell Owens, and for the better part of two weeks, unless you lived under a rock, it was impossible to ignore him.

Say what you want about Terrell – that he’s got an ego bigger than Barry Bonds’ head, that he points the finger to everyone other than himself, that he thinks he’s bigger than the game – the one thing you can’t say is that he was being selfish for playing in the super bowl.

Only six weeks ago, Owens was by all accounts done for the year, coming off a gruesome injury against the Dallas Cowboys. Shortly after the injury, surgery was performed and screws were placed in his foot. All hopes of seeing Owens on the turf again this season naturally faded away. Or did they?

Two weeks ago, Owens guaranteed that he’d play in the Super Bowl in Jacksonville. But instead of being praised for his toughness and his desire to help his team win a championship, he was ripped from coast-to-coast for being a selfish player determined to wreck his own career for the glory of the headlines.

Why was this the case? Why was T.O. held over the flames for doing something that had any other player tried, these same writers would be praising him. Imagine if Brett Favre, a former pain kill addict and alcoholic, or Ray Lewis – charged in murder - decided to throw caution to the wind and try to play in the biggest football game in the world this year? You don’t think the media wouldn’t have embraced this? If so, you are kidding yourselves.

So why the T.O. backlash? Maybe it’s as simple as a player losing all benefit-of-the-doubt due to his previous actions? Or, maybe it’s something much worse, a racial backlash? One can’t quite help but wonder if the public and media would have been as outraged at a player over a Desperate Housewives promotion and playing injured in the Super Bowl if his name were Brett Favre or Tom Brady. That’s just the simple truth.

But the fact of the matter is, is that what T.O. did yesterday was nothing short of amazing. For him to receive over 125 yards was astounding, especially against that defense, I don’t care how good you are. Running in practice is one thing. Running with the New England Patriot defense chucking you at the line of scrimmage and hitting your legs, that’s something different all together.

And for once, I’m standing up for T.O. and praising his actions. Will his heroic performance be able to change his standing amongst the majority of the American public? Who knows? But one thing’s for certain, the public has proven that it will forgive off-field misbehavior much faster than any harm you or your ego caused on it. T.O. is a shining example of that.

The Real American Crisis

by Gene

While the President spent the majority of his speech glad-handing to his fellow Republicans and preaching about the future perils of Social Security, one might think the sky is falling. After all, what’s a current 29 year old to do in 40 years when the well runs dry on Social Security? Where will his retirement come from?

Don’t worry my son, for the President has a vision. Private savings accounts, where you will be allowed to gamble away your “security”. Oh, and don’t forget about the billions and billions of dollars that the securities brokers and financial institutions stand to make on this windfall of a deal. (These are the same lobbies, by the way, that donated tens of millions to your campaign the last few years. Shhhhhhh, don’t tell. Maybe no one will notice.)

Yes, the President is looking to turn the New Deal into the Raw Deal. While the plan is disguised as a way to help the average American and keep the program afloat before it goes bankrupt, it really turns out to be a major kick-back to Mr. Bush’s supporters. It also goes along the lines of Bush’s “ownership” philosophy. Basically, in the world of Bush, you must own something to be something. He said so in his campaign. “I believe that a person that owns something has a stake in the future of America.” That’s all well and good Mr. President. It’s even better if you come from a family of millionaires who cajoles with millionaires and has no need to worry about financial insecurity.

The most disturbing trend in this new debate on Social Security is that the President is once again misleading this country about a “crisis” that isn’t a crisis at all.

Mr. Bush’s staff has once again concocted its “telling numbers” by devising their own formulas for when Social Security ends. These new formulas tell a shocking number: that Social Security will be bankrupt in 42 years. If you look at the real method these numbers are determined, you’d see that Social Security is projected to have a slight deficit in 50 years, but nothing that can’t be fixed with slight tweaking.

The program that DOES need the most work is the healthcare industry and Medicare.

According the government’s annual statistics, Medicare stands to have a projected deficit five times larger than Social Security in much shorter time. Combine that with the ever-increasing costs of health care in this country and, ladies and gentlemen, here’s your real crisis.

How many of you have seen double-digit percentage increases in health care employee contributions the last four years? How is it that a small, 80+ year old business in Livonia, Michigan, Awrey Bakery, has seen its employee contributions for family health coverage rise from $450 to $820 in only three years!

If you a looking for a true crisis folk, you have one. And, this crisis doesn’t have the potential to be here in 40-50 years. It’s here now and we are all dealing with it.

The sooner the President sees this, the better. Unfortunately, in his neo-conservative world of millionaires and boosters, they never have to worry about health care cost.

It’s amazing how much brighter the real world looks when you are living in one made of fantasy.

Uh Oh, Jay Z in Trouble Again

Actually, it's Jay Z' grandfather who got busted this time.


Jay-Z's Grandfather Busted With Trunk Full Of Canadian Prescription Drugs

BUFFALO, NY—Tyrone J. Carter, rap artist Jay-Z's 75-year-old grandfather, was arrested Monday for transporting prescription drugs across the Canadian border in the trunk of his 1998 Oldsmobile. "My grandson says I shouldn't have unlocked the trunk unless the cops had a warrant, but what's a man supposed to do?" said Carter, who was busted with more than $1,000 worth of pharmaceutical-grade Diovan, Lipitor, and Lanoxin. "Don't the police have anything better to do than hassle a sick old man? My insurance doesn't cover my pills anymore—I gotta get my heart medicine somewhere." The arresting officers said the pills had a U.S.-pharmacy value of nearly $18,000. (courtesy of the Onion)